Alex Salmond praised for helping homeless in Glasgow

Alex Salmond built his political powerbase in the north east of Scotland, where he was first elected to Westminster as the MP for Banff and Buchan in 1987. He grew up in Linlithgow and joined the SNP as a student at St Andrews before working as an oil economist

Alex Salmond first became SNP leader in 1990 when the party had declined from the high point of support in the 1970s and was one of just three MPs after the 1992 election, seen here flanked by Margaret Ewing and Andrew Welsh.

For many years the former James Bond star Sean (later Sir Sean) Connery was the the SNP's highest-profile supporter, also helping to fund the party. They were friends for 30 years. Alex Salmond said of him: " He is the world's greatest Scot, the last of the real Hollywood stars, the definitive Bond."

Alex Salmond's SNP won the 2007 Scottish Parliament election in what he would describe as "as a 50 year storm", beating Jack McConnell's Scottish Labour by 1 seat to become the largest party at Holyrood. After a count disrupted by technical glitches with electronic vote counting machines the final result was not known late afternoon the next day. Alex Salmond audaciously flew by helicopter for a press conference in the grounds of luxury hotel in Edinburgh to stake his claim to form a minority government.

Until their spectacular falling-out, Nicola Sturgeon was among Alex Salmond's closest political allies, serving as his Deputy First Minster, and playing a leading role in the independence referendum campaign between 2012 and the vote in 2014, seen here with him launching the 'white paper' called Scotland's Future

Alex Salmond was one of the most energetic campaigners in Scottish politics all through his career, seen here during the referendum campaign posing with cupcakes on a visit to the Brownings Bakers bakery in Kilmarnock.

Alex Salmond announced his resignation as First Minister and SNP leader the morning after Yes lost the independence referendum by 45% to 55%. But it wasn't long before he returned to the political fray, taking the Gordon seat in the General Election of 2015 as the SNP took 56 of the 59 Scottish seats in the wake of the referendum.

The low point of Alex Salmond's political life came following accusations made against him by a number of women during his time as First Minister. He resigned his SNP membership. At his trial at the High Court in Edinburgh after he was cleared of attempted rape and a series of sexual assaults, including one with intent to rape, against nine women, who were all either working for the Scottish Government or within the SNP at the time. His relationship with Nicola Sturgeon would break down and the handling of the complaints would subsequently be found to have been "tainted by apparent bias", according to a judge at the Court of Session who awarded Mr Salmond more than £500,000.

In 2021 Alex Salmond formed a new nationalist movement called Alba. Long-time political ally Kenny MacAskill became their first parliamentarian when he switched from the SNP. The party failed to hold onto any seats at the 2024 General Election. Ash Regan continues to represent the party as an MSP at Holyrood.

Beyond politics, horse racing was one of Alex Salmond's great passions. Here he poses with Frankie Dettori, having presented him with a tie after the jockey won the Ayr Gold Cup.